The long-awaited death of a terrorist

Nelson Mail editorial, May 5, 2011
In life, Osama bin Laden was first and foremost a propagandist par excellence; a murderous, twisted hater for sure, but principally an expert at disseminating his anti-Western bile, exploiting and harnessing the resentments of radicalised Islam, and helping to engineer and inspire some spectacular and awful displays of the power of terrorism. So there is a fitting symbolism that his death at the hands of US special forces at the weekend has delivered his most-hated enemy a giant propaganda coup of its own.
Like all the grand propaganda gestures, Monday's presidential pronouncement of his death sounded spectacular, but is of uncertain substance. Its meaning beyond providing the Americans with an excuse to celebrate their righteousness is anybody's guess. Nevertheless, the demise of one of modern history's most unpleasant creatures is welcome and overdue, and a much-needed strike back against his noxious creed.
Much of the torrent of commentary in the past couple of days has focused on bin Laden's waning significance in the scheme of things; of how the al Qaeda network he founded has been sidelined as Arab people have looked to a new future of freedoms and democracy. Some have wondered what practical significance he still held. From once being portrayed as the civilised world's Public Enemy No.1, he was increasingly dismissed as a caricature, a mad, bad, self-styled prophet, supposedly living in a cave and ranting to the converted.
None of this should be allowed to diminish his revolting legacy. Bin Laden had long since done his damage, and it is profound. He was the manifestation of a perverted distortion of Islam which has reshaped the world in the decade since his most grotesque crime, the September 11, 2001 attacks on America. He tainted the place of Islam in the West, provoked far-reaching constraints on ordinary liberties, triggered wars, and reshaped the political landscape of the United States, the Middle East and beyond.
The power of his myth, his status as the bogeyman of George W.Bush's War on Terror, was graphically displayed on the streets of Washington DC and New York on Monday as the crowds gathered to celebrate news he was dead. Some may argue that investing so much symbolism in one man is ridiculous. It is true that one of the new cliches of the post-bin Laden era – that the world is a safer place without him – sounds like a stretch. But the display left no doubt that the grief and anger of September 11 has never sunk far below the surface in America. 
That country's intelligence agencies and special forces will also enjoy the rare opportunity to brag of a high-profile success. It was clearly an extraordinary operation and one which raises among many questions the one about Pakistan's role in bin Laden's fate – a murky business which seems bound to never come clear, but can only feed suspicion about that country's on-going contribution to the volatility of one of the world's most unstable regions.
But that too is more speculation. For those who seek something definite, perhaps the best that can be taken for now is that while bin Laden's death may not in itself deliver any gains beyond the symbolic, the world has most certainly suffered no loss.